Annie Parker Decoded: The Story That Inspired the Film

In 2008, Steven Bernstein, an award-winning cinematographer, met Annie Parker. He was inspired by her story to direct and write Decoding Annie Parker (2013).

The film follows the journey of Canadian Annie Parker (played by Samantha Morton) who learns she has breast cancer, the disease to which she lost her mother and sister. While Annie is struggling with the physical and emotional impact of her illness, she is convinced that there must be some hereditary connection for the cancer that devastated her family.

In the USA, geneticist Dr. Mary-Claire King (Helen Hunt) is a researching the still unidentified link between DNA and cancer. Decoding Annie Parker depicts the heartbreaking struggle of battling breast cancer and the scientific dedication that led to the revolutionary 1990 breakthrough of the identification of the BRCA1 gene, responsible for many breast and ovarian cancers.